Nacoochee: A Valley at the Crossroads

Geographic

Nacoochee Valley lies in an east-westerly location, below the slopes of Georgia’s Blue Ridge mountains. Majestic Mt.
Yonah presides over Nacoochee from the south, and at points the valley is touched by the waters of the Chattahoochee
River, Duke’s Creek and Sautee Creek.

The geographic features that make these valleys visually striking helped shape their human history as well.

Cultural

Nacoochee and Sautee Valleys rest at the intersection of past and present, offering reminders
of the evolution of this area and its role as a living crossroads in history.

From the footprints of native peoples, to the changes wrought by white settlements, this region has served as the backdrop for interactions that began thousands
of years ago and continue to the present day.

Economic

What makes this area an economic crossroads? The junction of the Unicoi Turnpike, now
state highway 17, and the Old Rabun Trail, plus the Chattahoochee River and the Sautee Creek.

This made the area extremely accessible to native peoples and white settlers, and encouraged
agriculture
and later
commercial
developments.

Environmental

A
gold rush
brought settlers to the region by the thousands in the late 1820s. The remaining Cherokee were displaced by
white settlements and economic interests. Intensive
mining
using water cannons to strip topsoil from mountainsides left vast wasteland.

NE Georgia forests lured the
timber industry
to the region, devastating the environment again in the early twentieth century.